Clevenger's departure was surprise to very few

Boston obvious candidate to replace him

Henderson County High School football assistant coach Josh Boston (Gleaner photo by Darrin Phegley â¢ 831-8375 or dphegley@thegleaner.com)

Clay Clevenger’s resignation on Monday to return home to Danville came as a surprise to very few.

The benefit of suspecting this day would come is that there has been time to ponder what happens next.

A solid program with four straight nine-win seasons, Henderson County’s vacant football coaching position will draw plenty of interest.

The elusive goal of winning a state championship seems far-fetched in 6-A football dominated by Trinity, which has won five of the six crowns in 6-A and 10 of the last 12 in the state’s largest class whether it was 6-A or 4-A (before 2006). Still the Henderson County job is a good one and the eventual finalists who earn interviews will reflect that.

The most obvious candidate is the one who is most familiar with the program and leading it in the absence of a head coach.

Though still a young coach, Josh Boston is the senior member of the Colonel staff. He had already spent one season as an assistant under Duffer Duffy when he was retained by Clevenger, who had recruited Boston to play college football at the University of the Cumberlands.

In each of his six seasons on Clevenger’s staff, Boston’s responsibilities grew. He was named the defensive coordinator and associate head coach in 2010 after Bob Lawson left to take the head coaching job at Lexington Dunbar.

“The defense has continually gotten better each year. This year he did everything on the defensive side,” Clevenger said. “He’s earned his shot and he’s ready.”

Boston was already in charge of the team’s offseason conditioning program so an interim head coach won’t be named, athletic director Vivian Tomblin said. There’s no need. She hopes to have a new coach in place before the start of spring practice.

Clevenger has already made his pitch — both publicly and privately — for Boston to be the next head coach. “For what it’s worth, I’ve thrown all of my support behind him,” said Clevenger, who offered his opinion to Tomblin and HCHS principal Sally Sugg that Boston should be his successor.

The main strike against Boston is that he has no head coaching experience. Neither did Clevenger when he was hired in 2007. Neither did Nathan Isenberg when he took over the baseball program one year earlier. Tyler Smithhart had only one season under his belt as a head coach when he was hired to lead the Colonel basketball program.

Henderson County has a recent history of hiring bright young coaches. Each of those moves has worked out well.

Like Smithhart, Boston is a Henderson County graduate. He played in the program. Its success means more to him than one who has no connection to it. Much like Clevenger’s desire to go home and lead the Danville program, Boston has that same desire for Henderson County.

The stability and recent success of the program is Boston’s biggest asset. With things going well, there’s no need for big changes. Boston’s hiring would make for a smooth transition with the possibility of the remainder of the coaching staff staying intact.

Clevenger has no doubt the players would respond to Boston. “The players have confidence in him,” he said.

Boston is going to be a head coach somewhere soon. We’ll have to see if that is at Henderson County or elsewhere.